Secondary esters can be used for a variety of products, such as base fluids for wellbore treatment fluids, drilling fluids, etc. The use of a particular secondary ester product in a particular application can depend on the type of physical properties displayed by the secondary ester, as well as on the toxicity of the secondary ester, and such properties can be a result of the process used for producing a particular secondary ester, e.g., reactants, ratios of reactants, catalyst, etc. Thus, there is an ongoing need to develop and improve secondary esters compositions and methods for producing these secondary esters.